Today being Bungie day, they’ve released a few freebies for us:

• A theme and gamerpics (Today only!)
• The ‘Cold Storage’ Map (From here on out!)

There’s also a Cold Storage FAQ.

Go jump on Xbox LIVE and download them.

Update: Xbox.com’s Bungie Day page.

To follow up on Monday’s initial impressions of Connect360 version 3.31, specifically the following note I added after attempting to upgrade to version 3.33 which they released later that day:

Update: [Later in the day] It’s now been updated to version 3.33 and the change log notes that v3.32 was supposed to fix Mac OS X 10.3.9 support, but it still fails to launch on Emily’s G3 iBook running 10.3.9 with all the latest software updates. It (v3.33) also will not start media sharing on my MacBook Pro running Mac OS X 10.5.1. Doh!

I contacted them regarding those two issues and yesterday morning received emails back from them stating that they had released version 3.34 to resolve those issues. So, last night I upgraded both machines to Connect360 v3.34 and tested.

It now works on my MacBook Pro running Mac OS X 10.5.1, but still fails with an, “Unable to load Connect360,” error message on the iBook G3 running Mac OS X 10.3.9. I wholly expect that they’ll provide another fix or workaround for 10.3.9 shortly.

Oddly, the CHANGELOG file in Connect360.prefPane/Contents/Resources/ still only lists the following changes for the version 3.3x updates, but it’s obviously more for internal reference:

VERSION 3.32
- Fixes 10.3 incompatibility

VERSION 3.31
- Stability improvements

VERSION 3.3
- Added folder support for Movies
- Made Movies folder rescan interval configurable
- Fixed size of prefpane in OS versions earlier than Leopard (10.5)
- Fixed port sharing with MediaLink
- Fixed a little bug with the prefpane when ports are in use
- Improved activation system
- Fixed trial mode song counts
- Updated ffmpeg transcoder
- Added WMA audio streaming
- Improved stability for shoutcast streaming
- iTunes Library is now auto detected
- Improved networking code
- Improved support for multiple Xbox connections (3.31 really, pushed in)
- iTunes video playcounts are now updated too (3.31 really, pushed in)

Also while I was out of town, Nullriver released version 3.31 of Connect360, their Xbox 360 media streaming app for Mac OS X, on April 24th. This new version has the following changes:

• Added folder support for Movies
• Made Movies folder rescan interval configurable
• Fixed size of prefpane in OS versions earlier than Leopard (10.5)
• Fixed port sharing with MediaLink
• Added WMA audio streaming
• Updated ffmpeg transcoder
• Improved stability for shoutcast streaming
• iTunes Library is now auto detected
• Improved networking code
• Improved activation system
• Fixed trial mode song counts
• Fixed a little bug with the prefpane when ports are in use
• Improved support for multiple Xbox connections
• iTunes video playcounts are now updated too
• Stability improvements

Jump Ship or Tread Water?

I was quite surprised as Connect360’s development has been quite stagnant for a while (esp. with the release of their PlayStation 3 media streaming app: MediaLink). I wasn’t sure how long I’d have to wait for an update, if one ever came.

I had been considering¹ Cynical Peak’s addition to the Mac Xbox 360 media streaming app market, Rivet, but had turned it away for the time being because it’s Leopard-only. Emily still uses a G3 iBook running Mac OS X 10.3.9—Yeah, I know, it’s well overdue for an upgrade to Tiger—to stream her music to the Xbox 360, so I didn’t really want to be running two different softwares and possibly causing confusion as to why some features work here and others only work there.

Impressions

Here are my initial impressions after the upgrade, feature-by-feature (at least the ones I’m interested in):

Added folder support for Movies

This had somewhat been the bane of my existence, esp. after the Xbox 360 2007 Fall Dashboard Update had changed—for the worse—the way is shortened filenames. One big list of all the movies in my movie folder, including TV & video podcast episodes, was not only completely unruly, but took forever to scroll through.

It’s a little better now, but unfortunately Connect360 only allows one level of folders, so it dumps² all subfolders (and subfolder’s subfolders) into the main Movies folder and tries to categorize misc. movie files in the various directories. In general it’s more organized, but things still aren’t where you’d expect them.

Two steps forward, one step back.

Made Movies folder rescan interval configurable

This one is useful since I never knew what the rescan rate was in the past. I wish they’d just use launchd to watch the directories in the movie folder you select so that they’d automatically know when anything was modified, but this is better than nothing.

Fixed size of prefpane in OS versions earlier than Leopard (10.5)

While I’ve since upgraded to Leopard, I noted this minor annoyance in regards to their update which coincided with the 2007 Fall Dashboard Update and so am glad to hear that it’s fixed. It was only a minor visual bug though.

Updated ffmpeg transcoder/Improved networking code

I don’t know if this is exactly the feature bullet point that this falls under, but it’s much faster to browse media from the Xbox 360 now and streaming starts faster.

Improved activation system

There was one side effect here, I had to reenter my activation code. No biggie.

Stability improvements

Only time will tell on this one.

The previous version had been pretty stable on my MacBook Pro running Leopard, but it frequently locked up on Emily’s iBook running Panther (requiring a full reboot). Hopefully all that will be solved.

The Not-Nearly-So-Final-At-All Word

It’s great to see that it’s still being actively developed and they’re focusing on significant improvements. Hopefully Nullriver will be able to improve the movie folder hierarchy issues, but it’s still worth the update as-is.

Update: [Later in the day] It’s now been updated to version 3.33 and the change log notes that v3.32 was supposed to fix Mac OS X 10.3.9 support, but it still fails to launch on Emily’s G3 iBook running 10.3.9 with all the latest software updates. It (v3.33) also will not start media sharing on my MacBook Pro running Mac OS X 10.5.1. Doh!

¹ See Jared Kuolt’s Rivet; A review. [via Daring Fireball]

² It doesn’t really move directories, that’s just the way it displays them through the Xbox 360 interface.

Nullriver’s always been quick to support upgrades to Connect360 whenever Microsoft releases an update to the Xbox 360 Dashboard, and this time is no exception. On Tuesday, they released the Fall 2007 Dashboard Update, yesterday I touched on my initial impressions of said update, and sometime thereafter Nullriver released Connect360 3.2.

Versions 3.2 is a small¹ update in that it simply adds support for streaming XVID/DIVX video (in AVI containers) to an Xbox 360 running the Fall 2007 Dashboard Update. I upgraded this morning and was immediately able to stream the GUIdebook Gallery’s archive of the Welcome to Newton video (which is XViD in an AVI container) to my Xbox 260.

I do now have a layout issue in the Connect360 preference pane, but it’s merely and annoyance and it’ll probably be fixed easily enough.

On a related note, I highly suggest those that want to play various media formats such as XViD/DIVX in QuickTime on Mac OS X go and grab a copy of Perian. ‘Nuff said!

Update: The “layout issue” I described above turns out to be a difference in the size of the System Preferences window in Leopard from Tiger. Nullriver is currently suggesting upgrading to Leopard to fix this annoyance.

¹ I say “small” only because with the Spring 2007 Dashboard Update, Microsoft managed to cause Connect360 to fail and so Nullriver had much more work cut out for them.

Yesterday marked the release of Microsoft’s Fall (2007) Dashboard Update for the Xbox 360. While it it’s not exactly, or even technically, Fall anymore, I still welcome updates to the Xbox 360 Dashboard since they only offer them up twice per year.

While there are a few features like friends-of-friends and enhanced profiles that may be useful, and Xbox Originals which could potentially provide some inexpensive additional fun if they didn’t require purchasing another hard drive, what I was really looking for was the video enhancements.

Although I enjoy the weekly Gears of War, Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, and Halo 3 bloodbaths with the guys, the primary use for my Xbox 360 is actually as our entertainment system. The Spring (2007) Dashboard Update brought much-needed support for MPEG-4, H.264, and AAC video & audio formats which made it an excellent addition to our Mac-based household. Nullriver’s Connect360 software fro Mac OS X was then was able to stream our iTunes music, iPhoto photos, and all our MP4 videos to the Xbox 360 and thus our 1080p LCD TV.

This latest update has added support for further MP4 video codecs and the AVI container. This is less of a concern for me as I try to encode everything with H.264, but it does mean that videos from my digital camera can now be played natively. A nice little bonus.

However, it’s the User Interface changes that have both enhanced and curtailed my overall Xbox 360 experience.

First, the good. They’ve redesigned the Xbox LIVE Marketplace so that it’s easier & faster to browse. They’ve also added full-screen streaming previews, which is a very welcome improvement. And, what threw me at first, they changed around the way you select your music/photo/video source.

I thought it was going to be a pain in the ass and confusing, but it actually works fairly well and has one major bonus: multiple computers are now automatically displayed in the source list! Previously, you could connect to a computer (e.g. one of our Macs running Connect360) from the source list, but if you wanted to switch to a different one then you had to go to System -> Computers -> Disconnect and then back to the source list and search for a computer to connect to. Now it’s automagical:

Unfortunately, with User Interface change comes User Interface blunder. The one that I’ve noticed and is almost a show stopper: they now truncate video filenames on portable devices (e.g. my USB hard drive). They used to shorten filenames by replacing the middle of the string with an ellipse (...), but now they just unceremoniously chop them off.

Can you tell which South Park Season 10 Episodes each of the following are? I can make some guesses because I’ve watched them so frequently, but really there’s no point in trying.

Fortunately, I can just rename the files to alleviate the issue, but it’s still a shame that they had to go from graceful solution to an inelegant and perplexing one.

Overall I do like the update, but there’s one thing that I’ve been waiting for the Xbox 360 to support that I have yet to see: DVD upscaling.

I have a large collection of DVDs and my Xbox 360 is configured to run in 1080p mode since I have a 1080p LCD TV. The problem is that every time I pop in a widescreen DVD—which, let’s face it, is the preferred format of DVD—I have to switch the TV to stretch the DVD to fit. Why? Because the Xbox 360 switches to the native resolution, but still sends the video in anamorphic (squashed horizontally) format.

If only they’d support upscaling of DVDs, I’d be all set!

While I subscribe to the "Less is more" philosophy, I’m actually pretty poor at adhering to it. I have a major case of information overload in my digital life and junk clutters up both my digital and anolog lives. I’ve been pretty good with the RSS feeds that I subscribe to, I’ve slimmed down this site, and I’ve started attacking the piles of unused computer gear in my apartment.

I’m going to continue whittling away what computer gear that I actually need and use until I reach a perfect harmony, a blissful happiness, or complete enlightenment. This week’s part of that task is the server rack in my living-room.

I’ve done all my web hosting from home for years due to the increased flexibility & control I have over the servers, the challenges I get to face, the practice, and the somewhat lower operating costs (ignoring the labor, of course). However, having a half-height server rack housing two servers, plus a bunch of networking gear, in our living-room for the past few years has grown tedious. It takes up a lot of space, it’s frickin’ loud, and it’s an eye-sore¹.

The current setup consists of:

• A home-built 18U, 4-post, open-air rack
• A Comcast cable modem
• A Dual 2.0GHz Xserve G5 providing web hosting and acting as a gateway/router²
• A 400MHz PowerMac G4 in a Marathon G•Rack, my former media center & file server
• An Intel Express 530T Switch
• A “Snow” AirPort Base Station
• LaCie D2 hard drives (rack-mounted, naturally)
• Rack-mount power strip & cable management accessories

Now, I’m not about to stop hosting from home, but I do want to reclaim some of the space, reduce the noise, and cut the electricity usage a tad. To pull this off I hatched a master plan to consolidate my server and network equipment to one small, quiet 8U desktop rack. The new setup will be as follows:

• A Middle Atlantic DR-8 8U desktop rack (with a couple Middle Atlantic U1 shelves)
• My Comcast cable modem
• A Gigabit AirPort Extreme Base Station which will provide WiFi as well as act as my new gateway/router
• A 1.83GHz Core2 Duo Mac mini which will provide web hosting and act as a file server
• My Intel Express 530T Switch
• My LaCie D2 hard drives
• My rack-mount power strip & cable management accessories

This new configuration will be a hell of a lot smaller, much quieter (there will be only three small fans: one in the Mac mini and two in my Express 530T), and draw much less electricity. An added bonus: the boxes for all the hardware take up less space in a closet than that of just one of my servers. There are also some added technical benefits, as well, including: a better NAT implementation³, support for more WiFi standards, gigabit uplink from my server to my router & network, reduced load on my server, etc.

The cost break-down?

1. Mac mini & AirPort Extreme – approx. $750
2. Middle Atlantic rack & shelves – approx. $90

Well under $1000. I’ll also be selling the PowerMac G4, the 18U rack, and possibly the “Snow” AirPort to further reduce that. Even when I bought the Express 530T switch two weeks ago the net cost to me was only $30 after I sold the switch it was replacing.

I brought home the Mac mini and AirPort on Friday and have already integrated the AirPort into my network as the new gateway. The 8U desk rack and shelves are on order and should arrive sometime this week. The migration of the Xserve’s configuration and data to the Mac mini will be the most time-consuming part of the project and I’ve got plenty of practice doing that sort of thing.

All in all, what will this get me? First and foremost: a much happier girlfriend; but also more space in a cleaner living-room, a quieter living-room (all the better for watching movies in), a lower electricity bill, and a pretty powerful server that I actually own.

I do still need a proper 1U rack-mount UPS, but that’s for later. I know, I know… I live in Vermont so I do really need a long-lasting UPS. Unfortunately, that’d cost as much as this entire new server setup.

¹ Emily’s never exactly been a fan either. In fact, she’s always hated it.

² Graciously loaned by Small Dog Electronics, Inc. for continued development, testing, and training. Fun, fun.

³ The built-in NAT in Mac OS X 10.4 (Tiger) Server always tests as “Moderate” on my Xbox 360 and so I get kicked off Xbox Live fairly frequently. The new Gigabit AirPort Extreme’s NAT tests as “Open” and so I have nary a hiccup now.